


with tired souls we slept

by monkkeyslut



Series: With Tired Souls We Slept [1]
Category: Soul Eater
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, F/M, Friendship, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-26
Updated: 2014-09-26
Packaged: 2018-02-18 22:19:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,301
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2364101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/monkkeyslut/pseuds/monkkeyslut
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They'd kept the name "Death City" and the sight of it left a bitter taste in Maka's mouth.</p>
            </blockquote>





	with tired souls we slept

**Author's Note:**

> I knoooooooooooow I've already dabbled in the Soul Eater Zombie thing but this time it's my own so it's different. Ish.  
> I'm thinking maybe I'll make this a series and write about what happened before and what happens after. But who knows with me, lbh

They had kept the name Death City, Maka realized with a bitter taste in her mouth. At her side, Black Star scoffed at the new sign proclaiming that the city was now infection-free. Most of Nevada was now, and many other states were getting there, but Maka was still shocked to see armed meisters walking the walls surrounding the city.

She shouldered her bag higher as she and Black Star reached the gate with several other meisters, weapons, and a stray human. She didn’t recognize the person that opened the gate, but she figured she probably wouldn’t recognize a lot of faces anymore.

The city was in the midst of being rebuilt. Many of the buildings that she and Black Star had grown up seeing were gone or burnt out husks of their previous selves. She could see the top of her old apartment now that some of the other buildings were gone and the sight made her stomach clench in painful knots. Her steps slowed and she allowed the others to pass her as she took in the new people and new surroundings in the once familiar city. Even the things that were the same—Mario’s barbershop, the pizza place, the corner store—were also different in a way. Mario’s looked dark and blood stained the brick outside the building so badly that even the person power washing the stone looked ready to give up. The corner store was boarded up haphazardly and the pizza place had broken glass strewn about.

When she inhaled deeply, Maka could almost feel his soul.

Black Star swallowed audibly as they passed a street that would lead to his and Tsubaki’s old apartment. Maka almost wanted to reach out and tangle her fingers with his but thought better of it when she watched his jaw clench and hands fist at his sides. They had both dealt with their grief differently, after all.

When the outbreak had first begun it had mostly shown up in weapons. The infection targeted the active weapon gene within them before spreading, turning their brains to much, bringing out an animal instinct that left them savage and hungry. After that it had begun to spring up in the dormant weapon genes. If a person was bitten, scratched, or came into contact with infected blood or saliva, they would turn too.

The uninfected meisters and weapons from Shibusen tried to help but soon it became too much; Maka and the others had tried to get somewhere safer (there had been rumours at the time of different cities having different safe zones) and in the process they had been separated from their weapons.

It had killed them to leave Tsubaki, the Thompsons, and…and Soul, but they had agreed to meet up again. They had set a time and a place and a _date_ and still none of them showed up. Black Star had made them wait a week in a highly infected zone before they’d needed to just… _go._

Being back home felt like a slap in the face; she thought maybe someone would be smart enough to rename the city considering the infection had _started_ here, but apparently not.

The huge steps leading up to the recently re-opened school seemed longer and steeper than before. Maka was exhausted and not in the mood to go and entertain Kid who had taken his place as Shinigami after his father had given up his life eradicating all the sick from the city and surrounding area. (Maka privately wondered how something that seemed so little in the big scheme of things could take out a Death God, but she didn’t know anything about gods or their powers, so there was that).

“You ready?” Black Star asked, voice hard and tight. She looked him over in her peripherals and if she were anyone else, she would just see a dirty man whose clothing had seen better days and who could probably use eight showers, but she was Maka and she had known him her whole life almost and she saw what others probably couldn’t. He was losing _something;_ his hold on reality, his hold on _life_ maybe. The war had made his skin thicker than it ever was before and he’d experienced more loss than anyone had a right to. Still, he hadn’t crumpled or even cried the entire time. Just soldiered on like he probably thought he had to. Maka was a bit ashamed—more than once he’d held her hand while she cried—but she knew he wouldn’t want that, either.

This time, Maka didn’t hesitate to grab his hand. He looked over at her, brows furrowed for a moment before smoothing, face going softer than she’d seen it in a while. His hand, sweaty and calloused, squeezed hers tightly.

“Yeah,” she murmured, starting up the stairs.

~

When they reached the courtyard at the top of the steps, Maka nearly choked on the breath she took.

It looked like a straight up crime scene; blood stains the stone and on her left there are bodies upon bodies covered with tarps and blankets. The smell of rot sent her stomach into her throat and it should not have, she’d had to smell like it a dozen times over the last year of her life, but in such a mundane place—it was surprising, is all.

Black Star dropped her hand abruptly and Maka tore her gaze away from the horror to her left, instead looking straight ahead at the person who had appeared from the giant doors leading into the academy. Some of the survivors around her murmured uncertainly about the woman steadily making her way toward them, but Maka didn’t pay them any attention and instead threw herself into the arms of Marie.

The Death Scythe’s arms were solid and strong as they held Maka to her and tears sprung to her eyes despite her best efforts against it. Distantly she felt Marie’s right arm shift to accompany the weight of another person, heard the woman murmuring things to both she and Black Star, but Maka couldn’t for the life of her understand what they were.

Eventually, Marie pulled away and stepped back, hands still on both Black Star and Maka’s shoulders, tight enough to bruise. Her face was sallow and her eyes were red rimmed, but she looked healthy enough.

“Give me a moment to address these guys and then we’ll talk, alright? I’ll bring you to Lord Death.” She seemed to twitch a little at the title and Maka couldn’t blame her; it must be different taking orders from a man who was both younger than her and a former student. Still, they both nodded and stepped to the side, tuning her out as she began to speak with their companions.

They had met them on the way to the city when their jeep had broken down. Black Star had thought he could fix it, but the guy only managed to fuck it up even more. By the time the sun had begun to set Maka was only too grateful to see the van bumbling down the road toward them, kicking up dust.

Marie’s welcome speech was brief and to the point and she rolled her eyes at them when she turned back to Maka and Black Star, linking their arms with hers and leading them into the academy.

Things didn’t seem much different in there, but Maka thought maybe it looked _too_ clean. Goosebumps rose on her skin as they passes a dark hallway; she didn’t think she would ever get used to dark spaces ever again.

They didn’t even make it to the Death Room before he found them, and Maka can’t deny him a hug after he rounds a corner and immediately bursts into gross, ugly tears. Nygus was with him and did a _far_ better job keeping all her bodily fluids in as she spotted Black Star.

They both surged forward at once and wrapped their arms around their respective parents. Maka’s Papa sobbed wetly and noisily in her ear. He whispered about how scared he’d been, how he didn’t know if she were still alive or gone like Sid, like Ox and Harvar and _Stein—_

“I’m here, Papa,” she whispered, holding him tighter before pulling away. She scrubbed a hand across her face to wipe away any excess moisture.

The rest of the walk to the Death Room was mostly filled with silence, aside from Spirit’s gross sniffling. Maka couldn’t keep her gaze off the walls—filled with dozens of pictures of weapons and meisters alike, all casualties in the war. Some were up so high that she couldn’t even see them and she wondered how long after she and Black Star told them about Tsubaki and Soul it would take for their pictures to appear. She was actually surprised that nobody had asked yet where they were, or maybe they knew better. Everyone had lost someone in the war.

Some of the pictures she recognized; Stein was up there, Sid, Ox and Harvar, Lightning, Anya, and several more she’d had classes with over her years as a student. Her mother.

When they reached the Death Room and entered inside, Maka wondered how she missed Patti Thompson’s picture on the wall.

Kid had his back to them, arms braced tightly behind him as he stared at a scene in his mirror—she could see that the people in the image were infected, so she imagined that it was still an infected town or city—but the image flickered away before she could see much more. When he turned around, Kid looked much the same as he had the last time she saw him. His hair was neatly combed, clothes clean and pristine, but there was a haunted look across his face, something she knew she had too. His smile was brittle and small.

Liz was what sent Maka’s heart beating erratically. Liz was what made Maka wish she hadn’t stepped into the room, because the guilt and sadness on her face was breath-taking and heavy. She looked years older than she was and Maka eventually had to look away from her.

Black Star came and stood beside her, close enough that she could smell the sweat on his sin and the feel the heat radiating off of him. She tried to mimic his stance; her back hurt from standing up so straight, but she could mimic the tired expression on his face.

“Welcome home,” Kid said after several moments of silence, arms loose at his side. There wouldn’t be any crying or hugging, not now at least, with him. Kid wasn’t the type to do it in the first place, and certainly not in front of so many people. “I’m glad that…that you’ve made it back here.”

“Yeah,” Maka murmurs after she realized Black Star wouldn’t say anything. “We’re glad, too. It took us a while, but we’re back for good, I think.”

Black Star started at her words, his face twitching slightly, and had to look away. “You should know that…that Tsubaki and Soul didn’t make it.” He said abruptly, disrupting the pseudo-calm that rested over the room.

Maka was almost grateful for his bluntness, because she didn’t know if she would be able to admit it aloud. Sometimes she couldn’t even breathe when she thought about Soul and the last time she’d seen him. He’d looked so worried and desperate when the officers had separated them all and she remembered thinking, _he’s such a worry wart._

His worries had, apparently, been founded.

Her hands clenched into fists at her sides and she clenched her jaw, hoping her chin didn’t tremble.

Kid looked taken aback, eyes wide and mouth slightly open. Around them, Maka could feel the other shifting and the short intakes of breath from their companions, but what shocked her most was Liz, whose eyes had finally lifted to the two of them, and the jealousy in them was almost palpable.

“You don’t know?” Her voice was rough and Kid turned to look at her, eyebrows raised in two perfect arcs.

“Elizabeth—“

“Your weapons are alive,” Liz snapped, trembling slightly. “They’re in the city _safe_ and alive and you didn’t—you didn’t even _know—“_ She began to laugh then, almost hysterically and although she would come to regret it later, Maka didn’t stick around to make sure she was alright.

Both she and Black Star began to run; his legs were longer and he was faster besides, but he didn’t try to outrun her, instead kept pace with her as she used her soul perception to find them.

Earlier she had almost—she thought maybe it was just because he’d spent so much time in the city before the war that she could feel a bit of his soul, but no, he was there this whole time.

She is out of practice—there hadn’t been a point in using it during the war, not when they realized Soul and the others wouldn’t be coming to the meet up spot—but as she reached out she immediately felt his soul reaching back.

“This way,” she shouted uselessly to Black Star, chest heaving as she pounded down the steps and around a corner sharp enough that she scraped her elbow against the brick of a building. Her heart felt like it might pound right out of her chest and sweat dripped into her eyes, burning them, but she didn’t slow down for a second.

_They won’t disappear again,_ a voice in her head whispered, but Maka was done taking chances.

She nearly tripped as she rounded another corner, but Black Star caught the back of her jacket and hauled her back upright, keeping hold of her until she caught her footing again. By the time they reached the new apartment complexes, she thought she might just die from a heart attack, it was beating so wildly.

Black Star didn’t stop for a respite like she did, just shoved past an elderly man coming out of the apartment lobby and Maka followed him, still trying to catch her breath. At least _she_ apologized to the man.

Black Star was already at the top of the stairs when she started and the look of desperation in his eyes mimicked her own. “Seventh floor,” she called up to him, knowing that was what he was asking silently, and started up the stairs after him.

It felt like forever, but by the time she reached the seventh floor (ignoring the ding of the elevator as she entered the actual floor because if she thought too hard about the fact that there was an elevator, she’d probably drop dead) Black Star was waiting outside a door.

Maka thought maybe he was waiting for her so they could find the apartment, but as she got closer she saw the homemade sign proclaiming that it was _Soul and Tsubaki’s_ apartment.

She suddenly felt very self-conscious. Surely she looked like a hot mess, and what if they weren’t home? What if they were with new meisters now, what if—?

“You knock,” Black Star choked out, shaking beside her. His eyes were wide and glossy and he looked more like the scared little boy who watched her fall from a tree and break her leg than the man she knew now.

_He needs me, now,_ Maka realized, steeling herself for anything and raising her fist, rapping it lightly against the door. There wasn’t an eyehole, nothing for their weapons to prepare themselves with, and Maka almost felt guilty about it.

She didn’t have a lot of time to think about it. Before Maka could properly gather her thoughts, the door flew open and revealed someone very familiar, but at the same time not.

She had only seen him in pictures that were years too old, but Maka knew right away the person who opened the door with a long-suffering sigh. “Can I—oh,” Wes stopped when his eyes landed on the two of them, brown eyes flickering back and forth between her and Black Star, before finally landing on her.

She watched him chew his lip for a minute, obviously torn between something, before nodding and pointing at her, “Bedroom on the left,” and then Black Star, “Kitchen; follow the hall until you reach the living room and then turn right.” And with that he slipped past the two of them and headed down the corridor, hands shoved in his pockets.

They watched him retreat with similar looks of confusion before turning to each other and nodding. He slapped her hand quickly before entering the apartment; stride faltering as he followed Wes’ instructions. Maka hurried into the apartment and in the direction Wes had sent her in, not wanting to intrude in any way on Black Star’s reunion.

The bedroom she entered was almost completely dark and Maka shivered, wrapping her arms around herself. There was a lump in the bed, blankets drawn all the way over the lump’s head, and Maka almost started to cry right then.

The lump shifted slightly and she heard her weapon sigh. “Wes, I told you I didn’t want anything to eat, fuck off.”

“That’s rude,” Maka chided quietly, voice watery as she stepped farther into the room, toeing off her boots. “Don’t tell people to fuck off.”

She almost couldn’t comprehend how fast the blanket flew off her weapon and when his eyes locked onto hers, she barely even noticed that his hair was sheared close to his skull or that a long scar left the side of his face discoloured. Instead, she stood there like an idiot.

“Maka?”

“Hey,” she smiled but it was small and shaking and she was going to cry probably the same way her papa did earlier, oh _gods,_ “I’m glad you’re ok—“

They almost fall back into the door when he grabs her in a hug, but she doesn’t mind. Her own arms wrap around him tight enough to bruise and she presses her face against his, snot and tears mixing in a gross mess. He trembled so violently that she was reminded of a fucking Chihuahua and the thought made her laugh and cry at the same time.

His tears were gross and fat as they fell on her collarbone. It was a while before either of them could speak again, and the first words he said were, “I thought you were dead,” he sobbed loudly and if he weren’t so distraught she’d tell him how uncool he was being, her silly weapon. “We went to the spot and you guys, you weren’t fucking _there_ and I thought they’d killed you or that you’d been bitten you big, stupid _moron!”_

What the _hell?_ “What spot did you go to? We went too!”

Soul pulled away, face blotchy and red and Maka was sure they made quite the picture right then. “The 7-11 on Riverdale?”

It’s almost funny, but it really isn’t. “We’ll meet you at the river at 7:11,” Maka sighs, shutting her eyes. “Black Star said you guys would be able to remember it because it was a store, too. I told him it was stupid.”

Soul’s face was stricken and she almost laughed but she bit it back in favor of kissing him, instead. “He’s outside,” she said, smiling when he kissed her again. “You can go yell at him later.”

“I’m sure Tsubaki’s giving him a foot up the ass as we speak.” Soul’s smile sent her heart fluttering again and Maka hugged him close, fingers nearly ripping the back of his shirt.

“I’m sorry,” he pressed his mouth against her ear. “I love you.”

Maka breathed in the smell of him and pressed her lips to his shoulder. “Love you too, Soul.”

~

 

 

 


End file.
